Police mental health: a look into the mental health of thousands of Aussie officers
In Australia, being a cop is glorified by many, but what are the negative effects of the job that people regularly overlook?
As a Police officer in Australia, you must meet and handle many people with bad intentions and broken lives. This, in turn, could potentially break you. Former SA Police Officer, Matt Newlands was almost a decade into his career as an officer when he ‘felt his mental health begin to decline.’
“It felt like all of a sudden I was in a really bad way and didn’t necessarily know it and didn’t necessarily know how to get out of it,” he said.
Only a year earlier, he lost a friend and colleague to suicide.
The stigma of mental health
Many police officers, alongside Matt, struggle with the stigma surrounding the subject of Mental Health in the Police Force. This is because they fear that they will no longer be permitted to serve in their current roles once they speak up about it.
Local Detective Senior Constable Adam Behr states:
“I observed my colleagues who had demonstrated signs of struggling with mental health issues or had put their hand up to say they needed help, being treated as though they were a liability by the organisation. We heard things like ‘They will never tour again’ or ‘Can’t see them having a gun again.’”
This hush-hush on the topic of mental health throughout the field is what leads some officers into bad places, causing them to struggle further in silence and, in some cases, battle with anxiety, self-harm, depression, PTSD, suicidal thoughts, agoraphobia, regular panic attacks, hypervigilance, flashbacks and nightmares. These challenges are reflected in the alarming statistics that follow.
Alarming statistics
More importantly, we need to compare the amount of Police suicides to the number of occupation-related deaths. By analysing this, we can see that the amount of officers who have died as a result of suicide is more than double the amount who have passed away while on duty.
The role of firearms
The constant availability of firearms presents significant risks for self-harm among officers, with 64% of police suicides being by firearm, whereas off-duty suicides are normally caused by hanging at 30%. This cannot be overstated, as most weapons used were service firearms, indicating the negative impact on mental stability, with it being right there.
Rank also seems to have a big impact on the choice to commit suicide, with most officers being either a Senior Constable or a Sergeant. This may be because the higher ranking leads them to attend more traumatic incidents and suffer from more severe PTSD.
One of the biggest problems here is the organisation itself and the support it offers – or lack thereof. That’s right. They have seen the effects, seen the statistics and have still done the bare minimum for their officers and continue to bury their heads in the sand.
The needs for organisational support
Detective Senior Constable Adam Behr shares:
“…The Police Force did not do anything to help me get the necessary treatment. I went and found a psychologist on my own and paid for it out of my own pocket, keeping it a secret that I was suffering for fear of losing my job. In my 11-year career, I have not had a single mental health debrief and was often told after seriously traumatic events, ‘This is what you signed up for.’ Some days I was forced to go to multiple traumatic events in the same shift and then just go to the next job or home like nothing ever happened.”
Many others share his same story, eventually cracking under the pressure of keeping their struggle a secret. This then leads them, in some cases to undergo forced Retirement on Medical Grounds. This is outlined in s94b of the Police Act 1990 which states:
Retirement on medical grounds
The Commissioner may retire a member of the NSW Police Force if–
(a) the person is found on medical grounds to be unfit to perform or incapable of discharging the duties of the person’s position, and
(b) the person’s unfitness or incapacity–
(i) appears likely to be of a permanent nature, and
(ii) has not arisen from actual misconduct on the part of the person, or from causes within the person’s control.
Now, there, of course, could be other reasons for these officers to commit suicide, but their trauma from their position would be a large factor in pushing them off the edge and leading them to do so. Yet, even with these factors, there are still over 65,000 serving Police in Australia. But, fresh faces don’t make a strong force because many youths strive to become officers, with the number of employees being 25-44 at 56.2%. The organisation knows all this and yet still puts its Officers through traumatic events without so much as a second glance. This is something that needs addressing as there is no help, no warning, no support, nothing. There are many petitions to give Police more mental health support which are free to sign and accessible, taking only a few moments to make a change. Because, the truth is, you can never truly know when someone is struggling.
Honour B, Year 8